<Begin Segment 9>

TI: So we were talking about how many of the people, or really all the people, the Japanese Americans, left Seattle. About what time was that? When, do you recall the timeframe when the congregation had disappeared?

EBA: Yes. It was in the early months of 1942. And in fact, Mother's Day 1942 was the first Sunday that the church was completely empty. And I remember my dad saying that he went into the sanctuary of Japanese Baptist and sat in, up on the, in his pulpit chair and just envisioned in his mind the people that had been there in that, in those seats in the auditorium there, and the youth group and the nursery school and so forth. So it was a very empty time.

TI: Okay, that's good. Did, on like on a special day like Mother's Day, would he have had a special sermon or something and was he thinking about that?

EBA: I'm sure he would have had a special sermon, right. But he didn't get to preach it that Mother's Day Sunday.

TI: So with the congregation in Puyallup, how did he stay in touch with, or how did the family stay in touch with people in the congregation?

EBA: Well, we made, it seems like almost daily visits to "Camp Harmony" in Puyallup there. And, of course, we could not go into the camp at all. The only Caucasians allowed in the camp were the WRA people. And so we would just stand outside the barbed wire and just reach through the barbed wire and touch our people and shake hands or try to give hugs. And if we brought gifts they were immediately taken from us by the guards there and they would rip the gifts open to see what was inside, 'cause they were looking for weapons or whatever objects of subversion that one has. And so, I mean, they just took it from us and ripped 'em open and gave it back, and then we just had to hand it through the barbed wire. There was barbed wire all around. And it's interesting because "Camp Harmony," you know, our people are in some of cattle stalls and some other hastily built shelters down there, but to think that this, this place of joy and fun and entertainment was now a place of containment. And all the cattle stalls, I think of the cattle stalls that held the livestock, legitimate livestock, now were housing illegitimate human livestock, illegitimate in eyes of the nation and the world.

TI: And going back to those exchanges by the fence, were you, did you ever see some of your nursery schoolmates, or was it mostly the adults doing this? Do you recall?

EBA: I recall mainly adults. I think the children were probably kept wherever they were keeping them. I remember also standing on the bridge, there was a bridge over the railroad tracks down there. And I remember the trains lined up and watching the Japanese, our, you know, our people, boarding the trains and being taken to Minidoka and Poston and Tule Lake and wherever, however they were distributed. And it was... the scenes of the baggage, or the freight cars actually, not baggage cars but freight cars, the doors being opened and people throwing their bags and their suitcases and whatever they could carry with them into these, these freight cars. And seems to me there was no, no rhyme or reason as to how you would find your, your goods again once you were at, you arrived at the camp, but, because it seemed like you just, thrown in there. They must've been identified by some, in some way, but... and just, it was a, it was a time and a feeling of puzzlement and not really, you know, my five-year-old mind not understanding war to begin with, but then to see these people that we love and lived next door to, to be jerked out of their existence and thrown into a concentration camp environment. And -- [coughs] -- excuse me. When we were at the "Camp Harmony," one of my sisters -- I don't recall who it was -- but she started crying and she said, "Oh, my friends, my friends, they're all gone. I only have two friends left at home." And she said, "They're not Japanese." So, for this sister it was just a heart-wrenching, heart-rendering time of separation. And it was just an empty feeling of loss and grief and... I don't know what other words to explain it at this point.

TI: And when you were on the bridge looking down at the trains being loaded, do you recall who else was up there?

EBA: I recall my father was up there and my mother and my sisters, and beyond that I don't recall anyone else. I don't recall any conversation. We just stood there in a, in this blank, empty feeling of unbelief that this is happening.

<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.